Grugger’s Way

Retirement Danger Six is the danger of Over-Exertion.  This is physical exertion, plain and simple.  And it is a real Danger because I spent the past eleven years sitting in front of a computer (emphasis on SITTING) and that was how I expended 50 hours of my life every week.   

My wife reminds me that the computer job wasn’t the problem but rather the fact that I didn’t do enough PHYSICAL activity to keep myself in decent condition.

The discovery that I can no longer do what I used to do all day long (not to mention all night long) shouldn’t have come as a surprise.  Unfortunately the surprise came as a shock to my back.  My lower back and, well, yes, my entire body was shocked.  This is physically painful, of course, but mentally it is an embarassment.  Just fourteen years ago I ran the San Diego Marathon.  All 26 miles of it.  That same year I also ran in four half-marathons and too many 10-kilometer races to keep track of.  My tee-shirt collection exceeded my book collection.  Then I left the area and left behind the nice San Diego weather for Montana weather, where I first tried to run in 6 degree temperature, up a hill, at over 3000 feet elevation (that’s elevation above sea level, not my attempted gain in elevation…ha ha ha; I wish).  

I joined a health club with an indoor track, but I still became pretty lazy.  My emphasis at the health club was on socializing (that sounds a lot like my college experience too).  I even married a woman I met at the health club’s yoga class.  Then we both let our memberships lapse, so what little workout I was getting in yoga fell by the wayside.  I succumbed to the laid-back, married lifestyle.  You notice I only said “I” succumbed.

I have no one to blame but myself.  My wife works out every day.  She does a 6 am workout and a 6 pm workout.  She walks, she runs, she treadmills, she yogas, she lifts weights, she bikes.  Our home fitness room rivals the health club in equipment–both in number and variety.  She even bought me equipment for my birthday…for her use, it turned out, because I became so lazy.

So eleven years later, I retired and decided to become very, very active in keeping the yard spiffy.  We started a garden that needed to be kept spiffy too.  And we had lots of large (and heavy) planting pots on the deck that needed to be moved around from time to time.  I had waited until I retired to clean out the garage and “get it organized.”  I had waited until I retired to clear out the dregs of my previous lives…all stored under the house in the crawlspace.  Now I know why it is called a crawlspace…if you don’t crawl, it is a back-killer.

 The sudden shock to my body was both sudden and shocking.  I had to re-evaluate my retirement routine as well as my goals.  My over-exertion and the physical breakdown my body suffered can be temporary.  My goals for physical fitness must become permanent.  If I don’t get myself back on a REAL workout routine, I am doomed to become one of those hunched over, “can’t get off the couch” old guys that I used to be so critical of. 

Yes, I am finally listening to my wife.  She’s right, I’m wrong.  I will do better.  I will do push-ups, I will do the treadmill, I will do more and I will do it carefully.  I don’t want to over-exert myself on this either.  (That’s famous strong-man Arthur Saxon on the right, not me.)

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